A schoolboy is to have his dream come true when he leads the Irish team out tonight for Ireland’s crunch game against Denmark at the Aviva stadium.

Football mad Daniel Bracken was given the chance of a lifetime to be an Irish mascot after his aunt Debbie wrote to the Ray D’Arcy Show to see if it was possible.

In a heartbreaking letter, she revealed her eight-year-old nephew lost his grandad to cancer and recently his mum was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer.

She has been very unwell and has been in hospital for the last two weeks.

Debbie wrote to Ray to try and make Daniel’s dream come true – to be a mascot for the Ireland’s World Cup play-off tonight.

She revealed Daniel had been left devastated when his grandad Gerry died two years ago, but never complained and instead has thrown himself into football.

Debbie revealed that Daniel’s mother has been in hospital for the past two weeks, but since then Daniel has been amazing giving his mum non-stop cuddles and even his favourite teddy.

Incredibly, team sponsors Three were listening to the show when Debbie’s email was read out and made it happen.

And today Daniel was in the RTE 1 studio with Ray to receive a signed Irish jersey.

Daniel told Ray how excited he was, saying that he had the hiccups on the way up in the car.

He revealed: ‘Ireland are gonna win! When I come back in from holding the players hands and singing the Irish anthem, my head’s gonna burst!’

Daniel also told Ray of his game plan for the team which he hopes to share with them in the tunnel.

‘We’re going to let Denmark attack a little bit and we’re gonna stay in defensive and then they might get a bit tired and then Ireland are gonna make their attack and then we’ve a better chance of scoring’.